


Synchronicity

by rowofstars



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Angst, Eventual Happy Ending, F/M, Friends to Lovers, Friendship, Soulmates
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-08-16
Updated: 2019-08-16
Packaged: 2020-09-02 12:16:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,812
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20275783
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rowofstars/pseuds/rowofstars
Summary: Storybrooke, Maine is a haven for people who haven't found or who have lost their soulmates, allowing them to live a happy, peaceful life away from the pressure to find their One True Love. Elias Gold doesn't believe in soulmates, or rather, he doesn't think there's one in the world for him. Until the library reopens.





	Synchronicity

**Author's Note:**

> So, this is a one-shot for now, but it will be expanded in the future. I like to call this my anti-soulmate soulmate AU because the idea that you have to find your soulmate to be happy, that there is a person out there in the world that you will know is The One the moment you see or touch or talk to them feels like it craps on the entire concept of what a relationship should be. So, I had this idea, wherein Gold and Belle are two people who have no soulmate, and who are trying to go through life without being overwhelmed by the constant nagging pressures of a society that doesn't understand or accept them. For the Writer's Month prompt #16: soulmates.

Elias Gold did not believe in True Love.

Well, it was a bit more complicated than that. He did, as a general concept, believe in the existence of a bond between persons, which had come to be referred to as Soulmates. Such bonds had been scientifically proven after all, and there were enough pairs of soulmates in the world now that it was far more the norm to have one than not. 

There were even professional services, both public and private, dedicated to searching out pairings for people. So extraordinary was the energy between soulmates, that it could alter them on a physical level, including, but not limited to, an enhancement of one’s sight that was described as a fog being lifted such that one could finally see the true beauty of the world. Emotionally, the sense of love and tranquility in these relationships, had come to be known as True Love. 

However, Gold did not believe that he, specifically, could ever experience the romantic form of True Love, nor did he entertain the idea that he had a soulmate. He had tried several different services, all claiming to be able to find him his Soulmate, and absolutely none of them succeeding. His hope had been shattered over and over again, and he had learned through the years to be content with the state of things.

His son, Neal, had a soulmate, found rather accidentally at a summer camp a year ago. Both of them were only ten and found the whole thing silly, but there was no denying the connection between Neal and Emma. Emma’s parents were soulmates, of course, and though sometimes their interactions were so lovey dovey that they made Gold feel ill, he liked them well enough individually. If things were to proceed as planned, he’d be seeing a fair bit of them over the course of Neal’s life, and he would just have to accept that they, like so many others, had what he couldn’t have.

These days it was strange for anyone to have a child with someone who wasn’t their soulmate, but at the time Gold and his now ex-wife Milah, had believed it could be enough to bind them together for the long haul. They were both in their mid-thirties when they met, and hadn’t found their soulmates. They’d met through a mutual friend, and got on well enough that they started dating. Plenty of people dated until they found who they were meant to be with, but there was always the understanding that it was temporary. 

When Milah told him she was pregnant, he didn’t think twice about marrying her, no matter how out of the ordinary society might have found it. It wasn’t as if they were the only people who found happiness outside of the soulmate bond of True Love.

Unfortunately, a few years later, Milah found her mate, and the peaceful life Gold thought he had made for himself fell apart. Milah divorced him and moved across the country, and Gold found refuge in the town of Storybrooke, Maine, founded by an enclave of folks who were mate-less. Some had found their soulmate only to lose them to a deadly disease, or a tragic accident. Others were simply too old to go looking any longer, or, as Gold believed, had none at all. 

He couldn’t say it was all bad though. Neal had a good relationship with his mother and step-father, a man named Rogers. Rogers was a police detective in Seattle, and Milah had found a new career working for an international soulmate search company. Twice a year, Neal went out to visit them, sometimes over his birthday, other times over a holiday. This year he would be staying for Christmas and New Years. Gold was not looking forward to being alone, but he knew that he and Neal would make up for it later. 

That was still a few months off, however. School was starting next week, and Gold had heard the town finally found a new librarian. There was always a curiosity around newcomers in places like Storybrooke. Everyone wanted to know what mate-less category they fit into, and if they’d be moving on once they found their soulmate. The previous librarian, a woman named Wendy Darling, had, after nearly sixty years of life, found hers and left.

Naturally, most of the town was happy for her. Gold just sneered and demanded the security deposit back on her apartment. What did she care? She was about to be deliriously happy for the rest of her life, however short that might be. 

The world wasn’t always a kind place, and for people like Gold there was a constant tinge of gray. Neal had tried to describe the colors he saw after meeting Emma, but all it ever did was make Gold annoyed. He understood that his son would see things differently, both figuratively and literally, but he didn’t want to hear about it in agonizing detail. He’d adapted a long time ago, treating it as if he was colorblind all together. His wardrobe consisted of mostly dark, sedate colors that were easily matched between shirts and tailored suits. His home was filled with antiques and knick-knacks, in a comfortable level of clutter that made his life feel somehow less empty by its very existence. The outside of the old Victorian was allegedly salmon pink, whatever that was, but to him it just looked vaguely brown and faded.

It didn’t bother him that he’d never see the world as Neal did. He was happy for the boy, truly, and when he looked at his son there was a light there that didn’t exist around anyone else. His love for his child was so great that at least in that small way, he was blessed by a true, unconditional love. Still, the townsfolk labeled him a bastard, and made remarks about how it was no wonder that there was no soulmate for him. 

Who could possibly love such a beast?

He reveled in the idea. It meant that he was correct after all, there was no one for him, and that True Love was not the universal ideal that everyone made it out to be. Maybe, in time, enough people would be like him that it wouldn’t matter, and the quest to find the one singular person on whom all your hopes and dreams hung would be a naive fairytale at best.

Gold looked out the window of his pawn shop, eyes narrowing at the building across the street.

Trucks were parked in front of the library with several workmen unloading boxes and carrying them inside. The building had been closed for over a year, but at the last city council meeting, Mayor Mills had announced that it would be reopening due to the hiring of a new librarian. 

He hadn’t seen any sign of this new librarian, but in his mind, he pictured an older woman, gray hair, a mouth that always looked like it was frowning, and a severe stare, like the Mother Superior at the convent. He smirked and opened the door, intending to nose around the library and see what was happening. The new librarian would need to sign a lease on the upstairs apartment, and, as it was his building anyway, he should be the one to bring it to her.

He stepped outside and immediately collided with someone.

“Oh!” came a high, soft voice.

Gold staggered backwards, one arm going out to try to brace against the building while the other squeezed the handle of his cane and pushed it against the concrete. Something fell to the ground with a soft thud, and a mass of hair hit him in the face.

“I’m so sorry!”

He shook his head and squared his shoulders as he stepped back, brow knit in annoyance. A young woman turned around, her dark hair flipping over her shoulder. She bent to pick up a book, and when she straightened, his lips parted and a for a long moment he held his breath. 

“Are you all right?” she asked, her head tilting to the side.

He met her gaze and held it, astonished by how blue her eyes seemed to be. Something was different about her, but after a long moment, he realized he was staring and recovered, fixing her with his best overdue renter scowl. “You should watch where you’re going, Miss -?”

“French,” she said, smiling. “Belle French. I’m the new librarian.”

His eyes trailed over her. The rest of her looked normal as far as he was concerned, the same drab, muted colors he always saw, but her eyes stuck out so strangely. He glanced down and saw her hand held out, presumably waiting for him to shake it, but he ignored her and she let it drop to her side.

“And you are…?” 

Belle’s eyes settled on his again, and he felt the disconcerting sensation that he was falling forward, that the world had somehow started to pivot around him and gravity had been thrown out the window. The blue of her eyes seemed to shift as he watched, brightening like a lamp being turned on, or the sun slanting through glass at just the right angle.

“Mr. Gold,” he replied finally, setting his cane in front of him, hands folded over the handle as stability returned. “I believe, Miss French, that we need to discuss the matter of your rent.”

“Oh, I’m not here to rent an apartment.” Then she held up the book she’d dropped after running into him. “I was told you might deal in rare books, and I was wondering about finding another copy of this.”

The book in her hands was thick and gray, though Gold supposed it could have been blue as well. He frowned and scanned the titled before rolling his eyes. _Her Handsome Hero._

“I’m afraid, Miss French, that I don’t traffic in trashy airport gift shop romance novels.”

Her face fell, and for a second he was almost disappointed.

“I see,” she said softly. “Well, thank you anyway.” 

She turned to cross the street, but stopped with one foot off the curb. When she turned back to him, something about her expression made him think she was having the same odd dizzy feeling he had, but then she shook her head and gave him a small smile and a shrug. “Maybe I’ll see you at the library?”

With that Belle French crossed the road, and Gold’s eyes narrowed. He shook his head and the odd feeling that had come upon him so suddenly, abated, but the color of her eyes remained alarmingly strange in his mind. He glanced up and down Main Street in front of his shop, but nothing about the world had changed as far as he could see.

“How strange,” he said to no one.


End file.
